Clockwork: The Sending
by Rastik
Summary: Dave Thicket is an average High School student: average attitude, average friends, average "C" average. But when he stumbles upon the technology of time travel, his life is bound to be altered forever. Dave now must confront the fears no man has faced.


Clockwork

"If a disturbance in one point of a timeline is done, then said disturbance's magnitude of change will escalate as time progresses because-"

I paused. This science project was less than unachievable; it was absolutely absurd. I didn't even have anything to say after "_because_" that was a proven fact. This would be my sixty-seventh crumbled sheet of paper that found its way into the bin, its demise due to what was written on it in bleeding ink: another impossible project that had a slight possibility to get me on good terms with my science teacher, Ms. Sickle. Her name was appropriate in two ways, both that she looked somewhat sickly, and if you would mistake her sloppily-written "i" for a "u" in her last name, she'd suck too.

Since childhood, I've always been that one kid who wanted to be an over-achiever, but in trying to be one I'd just barely make it with a borderline C in all my classes because none of them were really… compatible. The only class that _was_ compatible (a.k.a. get an A in the class) was science, and that was always a confidence-booster for me. It was ironic, actually, that on this particular year (Senior year in High School) Ms. Sickle—my new teacher for Physics—would grow a fierce resentment for me within the first week of school because my legend-of-a-big-brother Neil (may as well have had the last name,_ Armstrong_) had said to her face that she was the worst teacher in the entire district, ruining her reputation with both students and teachers alike, forever. This, in turn, fell to me because I was the younger brother of Neil and thought to be as menacing as he. Hence, the only class that I could succeed in was now the polar opposite; another desolate environment.

This oppressive curse that was placed upon me in Science was the reason I approached the Science Fair with such fortitude and audacity: it was _my_ chance to tell Ms. Sickle that her most despised student was also her best, and that her best was prepared to do anything to prove it.

"Nanobots, fission, portable LHC…" I began reading down my list of eligible projects whimsically, each one passing with ever-expanding deftness.

"…cure for cancer, cure for AIDS, cure for-"I squinted in order to further comprehend the ridiculously long word.

"Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis." I pronounced laggardly. Some website had claimed that this word was the longest in the English language, and I honestly hoped it was true.

"Mother of-"

"David, the food's getting cold!" I heard the faint echo of my mother's stultified voice. Even from the second floor, I could hear the click of her shoe tapping the floor impatiently.

"Coming mom!"

I'm Dave Thicket. Nice to meet you, too.

"So, how's our little punk doing in school?" my dad, Paul, questioned coolly. My mom's side of the family and my dad's side of the family would make two perfectly opposing circles in a Venn diagram. Margie's (my mom's) side was about as strict and uptight as any family could get; a boot camp of sorts where if you put a fork in the wrong spot on the dinner table, you'd be doomed to a life of mockery and relentless shame. Dad's side was that of a fat hillbilly with beer in one hand and a broken remote in the other. To put it simply, the world could break out into nuclear war, and while the rest of the world is in some bunker, dad's side of the family would be screwing with a broken antenna to get some signal back for football.

"You know… the usual." I responded, stuffing my face in with the uniquely chunky home-made clam chowder after I spoke. Both the parents, however different they could be sometimes, raised their brows mischievously, as if expecting me to say something more along the lines of "I have an A in every class, and the teachers love me- oh, and my homework is all done!". Even my younger sister, Macy, looked over to me, only her expression was more interrogative.

"So you went to detention again? Is that why you came home an hour late?" Macy spoke with a sinless tone. Even if she was only 11, she was still enough of a clever nuisance to make me consider socking her in the gut. Not only did her saintly smile convince my parents that she was a perfect child, but also that she was perfectly allowed to speak what she thought to be true (or in this case sarcastically funny), though detention wasn't the answer for me being gone.

However, her observations on my absence for an hour were somewhat correct. I _had_ come home an hour late, but to even _my_ surprise it wasn't because of detention. I had been talking with two of my friends, Greg and Al. They claimed to have seen an abnormally large meteor shower while watching the stars the night before, but had _accidentally_ forgotten to tell me. I'm a fan of _all_ science, so when I heard that they forgot to tell me about the coming of this of interstellar scrap, I thought that they were either tricking me or had somehow acquired a severe case of Alzheimer's. Unfortunately for me, they weren't playing around, so we had a 45-minute argument about how dumb they were for such a slip-up. Time passed me by like a speeding car, and so I came home an hour late. That's _also_ why I still had homework to do after dinner. Even though I never particularly liked it, my homework was usually done before my mom yelped "Dinner!" in order to watch a re-run of my favorite show, "_House M.D._".

"Detention?" my mother croaked, her fiery glare looking at me directly as though an alien to the household.

"Well, yeah." I retorted, feeling somewhat confused as to why she was so awed by the concept. "I pretty much get one once a week."

"Once- Well, nobody told me! Don't the school offices call you when something like that happens?" mom quizzed, her mind now buzzing with confusion.

"It happens so often to me nowadays that they don't even bother. Plus, it's never _really_ my fault. Ms. Sickle just says 'You want detention today or tomorrow' and I get a detention- without even doing anything, too!" Most kids couldn't get away with an excuse like that, but both of them knew of Ms. Sickle's resentment for me, so I was let off the hook.

"You should really consider talking with the principal about that, David. That simply isn't fair." Paul announced, almost seeming as though prepared to recite a speech from Lincoln to make the moment seem more patriotic and heroic.

"Or you could just quit lying to the parents and deal with it." Macy remarked, her brow raising up to make a cynical pucker-smile.

"Sure, and _you_ could tell the parents why Dad's suit was burned to a crisp last Christmas." I lashed back. The table grew to be more silent than a church in prayer, the sound of chewing and steady gulping being the only thing that could prove I wasn't deaf. Neither of my parents liked it when I made a comeback to Macy, and if such a thing came to pass, I'd be executed with guilt on the spot: in this case, a dreadful silence. We indulged on the chowder silent as church mice, and then went our separate ways for the night.

The evening passed slowly, each second feeling like the aftermath of me towing a car a mile uphill bare-handed. It was 11 when I decided to slip into my pajamas and head over to bed. Routinely, I brushed my teeth—28 brushes to every fourth of my mouth— using the pink brush Uncle Patrick gave me for Christmas the year previous (he said it was his when he was a kid...); immediately I checked it off my board. This board, particularly a crummy and splintered board with no dry-erase face to it (a flimsy sheet of paper used to replace it) and made wholly out of a plank of unfinished wood, was used each night for my mom to ensure that I had done all I need to.

"Did my homework," I began listing all that the sheet said. "Brushed my teeth, flossed teeth, _initiated_ bed-fluffing,"—my mother loved to try and use big words such as "ingenious" and "_maliquificiant_" (which to her dismay wasn't an existing word).

"_Inclusive_ taking a shower."

Even though he was lazy, I was thoroughly convinced that my brains—however much I had—came from dad. That, or mom had just lost her mind through the first few years of caring for Macy (we call it "care for Macy", but you all usually call it "Armageddon").

Gawking in amazement suddenly shut my brain off, leaving my hand to work without restraint from the leash of my mind. It checked all the boxes off with strokes of precision and skill, making lie after lie as it did. I honestly couldn't help but watch as my hand did such a feat… it went down like lightning, then halted as though hitting a wall, hence leading it to move up to make a ¾ "v" with the flawless lines; a magnificent checkmark in each box.

As I said, my brain shut off. This allowed me a minute of attention—which I used to watch checkmarks find their way on paper without the help of a brain (I probably could have watched on the Discovery Channel anyways)—then my body was forced to simply flap on my bed and fall asleep like a starving bear. Tragically, the night passed quicker than I had hoped.

"So- So then I tell the guy, 'No sir, _I_ did that'!" I heard my dad's voice as I walking downstairs, walking as though I was a jellyfish on land. I saw Mom, Dad, and my little sister-demon laugh—apparently I had missed the riotous joke, and an expression of "I didn't catch the punch line, could you please repeat it?" came over my face. Macy cocked her head toward me just as I walked into the kitchen from the living room; her glare was that of an angry lion's. She had instantly perceived my disarray, and— looking at it as an open opportunity to further my plummet of self-confidence—laughed louder.

"Oh wow, dad! That one was the best joke you've _ever_ told!" she winced, obviously feeling inside that it was another joke to put on Dad's _Made-Me-Vomit Joke Board_. Mom, being the gentle and caring person that she was, also supported Dad's joke—however bad it got.

"Did you hear that one, David? It was hilarious!" Macy expressed.

"Pipe a cork in it, witch-child. I'm not in the mood today."

Both parents took this cranky attitude as the first symptom, and hence pretended that I didn't say a word. What's this symptom I talk about? It was one day in about a year that I had this cloud looming over my head; a depressive attitude that seemed to possess me for two orbits of a clock. I sat down, ignoring what my mom and dad were saying to examine Macy's smug grin. I poured my cereal and milk blindly, fully concentrated on Macy and everything that she was doing. For some reason, my mind couldn't resist the thought of catching every mistake or folly act. My mind, in its entirety, was focused on her. And yet even then, my mind drifted off slightly from what my brain's goal was.

_What made me resent her so? What made her resent me?_

I had begun to make calculations in my brain; tally-marking every single incident and sign of cruelty. If I had written each tally down on paper—each mark as a word— it would have ended up being a trilogy of books. But it made no sense how the first word came to be. There was no first word… It was as though we just randomly began to strike at each other. The rivalry between us had a beginning not even I could decipher.

If you use your entire brain to think, then there isn't any left to do other things. In this case, ignore voices. Apparently the only reason I had such a silence to run my mind wild was because there wasn't anything to hear; nobody had talked for the entire minute.

"So David, _word on the street is_ you've got a science project coming up." Dad spoke, his throat still wet from the entire glass of orange juice he had just chugged. This made his voice sound almost guru-like: at peace with oneself and everything else around him.

"Huh? What?" I looked up as though being blind for the whole my life, but had instantaneously been gifted with sight.

"Science project?" He repeated, this sentence being more quaint and brief. I quickly pulled the scene back together from the disarray it had been in moments before.

"Yeah." I spoke in a nonchalant voice, almost at a level of stoic.

"Have you thought of anything interesting?" He quizzed. Every idea I had come up with was either impossible or had no general similarities to both Mom and Dad's careers (House-wife and engineer). For the first time that day, I had not only reacted optimistically, but also spurred myself on with confidence to come out with a blunt, straight-forward idea that my mind produced the night before.

"Time travel." I said dully, as though the very concept was _boring_.

"Ti- Ti-…"

Paul was possibly one of the most ferocious eaters I had ever met, and it was my honor to call him dad as well. Before I said those two words, he was busy chewing an entire delicious pancake in his mouth. The saliva-covered plug was due to reach Dad's stomach in ten seconds, but four seconds after swallowing it, I said 'Time travel' and he choked the thing back up to his plate.

"Looks half-digested, Pops." I remarked, playing around with him as he usually allowed.

"You-… You're doing _time travel_ as a science project?" Dad barked. It was as rare as a solstice that he would get angry, and at this? It didn't make much sense.

"_Why not_?"

Dad puckered his lips slightly, his perplexed eyes practically morphing into display boards saying: "Hey, my son's lost his mind!"

"David, time travel is… it's crazy at best! Not only that, but the very idea of time travel is too complex for anyone here." He expressed.

"Is it too complicated for _me_?" Macy asked, a deceiving halo appearing over her head. Hope that halo's got barbed wire on it…

"Of course not, you little munchkin; nothing's too hard for you!" Dad played around, his somewhat serious face altering to a smile for a few moments while pinching Macy's cheeks. She chuckled falsetto-like and skipped into the living room blissfully, her ponytail swaying slightly left and right.

"Now is there _anything_—anything at all—that you care to do other than this?" Paul quizzed.

"I've got a whole bunch of ideas, but none of them are easier than this one…" I grinned widely, a sudden downpour of self-confidence raining on me as I thought that I could _actually_ manipulate my father.

"Well then… The second you get home—"Dad spoke, a miserable tone littering his voice as though dreading it.

"Yes! That's one step for science, one giant step for science-kind. Right when I get home I'll get to work!"

It just so happened that the second I strode off the door and headed to the bus, that not only did the most complicated and outright ridiculous hypothesis begin to be my science project, but also that that day was going to be a somewhat happy day—one where I would fantasize about winning a Nobel, and becoming the next Einstein, and even imagine myself famous because of all the things I would solve one day. I walked up the steep steps onto our bus light-footed and contented, saying a sentence as though testing its sound.

"Dave Thicket, discoverer of the cure for cancer—master of time and space."

*Tick… tick… tick…*

I gaped at the slow-moving clock, my eyes round in anticipation and joy. _Almost out…_ I thought to myself. It seemed as though everyone in the classroom was as anxious to hear the bell crack through the halls as I was, so Ms. Sickle didn't even try to catch our attention. She just babbled on about the melting point of salt (which to my surprise was over 800 degrees Celsius), tapping her nails on her desk to rid herself of the anger that was slowly consuming her after realizing none of her students were being attentive.

"Two minutes…" Al whispered to me, neither of us taking our tired eyes off the sluggish hands.

"It seems like _all_ of us have plans after school." I responded, driving somewhat off-topic. He glanced at me for a moment, and then turned back to the _all-knowing_ clock.

"Speaking of plans, what are you up to? Determined to catch the next meteor shower or something?"

I chuckled, covering my mouth as to not let Ms. Sickle see my grin. It was a common-known fact that if she saw you laughing in her class—even if you weren't her most hated student—, she'd assume you were laughing at her and throw a detention your way.

"Meteor showers can wait, Al. My dad was a little worried at first, but he gave me the green light to play with time travel for a science project." I announced proudly, a few other kids around me overhearing.

"Time travel? You serious? You know, David, your goal in a science project is to actually _do_ something. Yeah, you've got some brains, but let's be real. Time travel is crazy, and you won't be able to impress _Suckle_ with something you can't test." Al exclaimed in a futile attempt to get me off the topic.

"Well _Suckle_ will be shocked when I invent a time machine, won't she?" I retorted, sarcasm sneaking up to me.

"Fine, David, it's your funer—"

"Did you say _time travel_?" I heard a fragile girl's soft voice come from behind me: I was utterly astonished. No girl _ever_ talked to me—it was practically forbidden! I had troubles turning behind me, fearing the idea that whoever had just interrupted us— two geeks'—conversation was just going to have a trio of girls mock us. Slowly, somewhat shaky, I turned my head and body to where the voice had come from.

"Excuse me… did you say time travel?" the voice came again. This time I saw her face as she said it, this time somewhat slower to ensure the words had reached my mind.

The owner of this voice was possibly one of the most popular and absolutely hot girls in the entire school; Sicily. Nobody knew her last name because her first name was as unique and rare as diamond in a mountain.

"Um… Ye- Yeah! I mean, _yeah_." I stuttered, trying to get the words right.  
_Why are you talking to me?_ I questioned myself, confused in every way. She wasn't the brightest girl in our advanced class, which was for sure, so why was she interested in such a mad idea?

Sicily grinned slightly, her eyes glowing in wonder.

"How are you planning to do that?" she asked. I felt a tingle run down from my neck as she spoke, as though her breath was a chilly winter.

"Well—I'm not quite sure yet, actually. But I'm hoping that something might come up!" my voice calmed, joking slightly as though she was already familiar.

"That's… cool.—" she whispered, gazing at the clock again. She quickly snatched her backpack from the floor and stood up.

*Bbbzzzzzz!*

_Of course; the bell rings right when I start to like school._ I thought.

"Bye—oh, wait. Um… what was your name?" Sicily asked, her voice blissful and upbeat. I was so happy that I had a girl—a popular one, at that—talk to me that I had to take a moment to research my name.

"I'm David." I responded, almost jumping up into the air.

"Nice to meet you, David. I'm Sicily." She conversed back, both of us sharing the same tone of _jumping up into the air_. Knowing her, she was like this all the time.

"I know." I quickly spoke. _Did… did you just say something smooth_, I interrogated myself. Two things that had stunned me in a timeframe of two minutes. She smiled affectionately, then walked off in a circle of friends. _Boy oh boy. If the president had that many people following him around, he'd be safe from cancer!_ I exclaimed, the voice echoing in my head. The class had emptied quickly—even Ms. Sickle had left. I heard a seat squeak as it moved behind me. Instinctively, I turned around, seeing Al standing before me with his backpack slung onto his shoulder.

"_Someone's _got a girlfriend." He said, a smile quickly growing on his face. We walked out of the deserted room into the buzzing highway of High School students in the hall. He grasped my shoulder, shaking it.

"Just don't let her get to you again." He retorted, a mischievous smirk flying onto his face as he left.

_I won't hurt her again. Never again._


End file.
